The Latter Glory of This House
1 In the seventh month, in the twenty-first day of the month, Yahweh’s word came by Haggai the prophet, saying, 2 “Speak now to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, saying, 3 ‘Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? How do you see it now? Isn’t it in your eyes as nothing? 4 Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel,’ says Yahweh. ‘Be strong, Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Be strong, all you people of the land,’ says Yahweh, ‘and work, for I am with you,’ says Yahweh of Armies. 5 This is the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, and my Spirit lived among you. ‘Don’t be afraid.’ 6 For this is what Yahweh of Armies says: ‘Yet once more, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, the earth, the sea, and the dry land; 7 and I will shake all nations. The treasure of all nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory, says Yahweh of Armies. 8 The silver is mine, and the gold is mine,’ says Yahweh of Armies. 9 ‘The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former,’ says Yahweh of Armies; ‘and in this place I will give peace,’ says Yahweh of Armies.”
To builders ashamed of their small work God says: be strong, I am with you, and the glory of this house will outrun the one you are mourning.
A month into the work, enthusiasm meets the comparison. Who is left who saw this house in its former glory? Old men had wept aloud at the foundation while others shouted Ezra 3:12, and now the question is put directly: is it not in your eyes as nothing?
God does not dispute the assessment. He answers with a command spoken three times — be strong, Zerubbabel; be strong, Joshua; be strong, all you people of the land — and work, for I am with you. The charge is Joshua's at the conquest Joshua 1:6, now given to men with trowels. Verse 5 anchors it in something older than the ruins: the word I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, and my Spirit remains among you.
Then the horizon opens. Yet once more I will shake the heavens and the earth and all nations — a shaking Scripture reads as still ahead, and reads for its purpose: what can be shaken is removed so that what cannot be shaken remains Hebrews 12:26–27. The nations' treasure will come, and the house will be filled with glory. Verse 8 forestalls the anxiety of men without funds: the silver is mine, and the gold is mine. The promise lands on a house, not a budget — the latter glory greater than the former. What made the first house glorious was never its cedar.
settled What this mark means